


Ghosts That We Knew

by red_lasbelin



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Complicated Relationships, Drug Use, Hangover, M/M, Morning After, Reincarnation, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-13
Updated: 2014-02-13
Packaged: 2018-01-12 09:30:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1184631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_lasbelin/pseuds/red_lasbelin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elves in modern times verse, with a dash of reincarnation. (Or - What happens when you find your longtime ex-boyfriend working in a tattoo shop.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ghosts That We Knew

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Burning_Nightingale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/gifts).



> Written for Burning_Nightingale, who asked for E/G and said she was up for any type of AU. I took your request and ran screaming with it, lol. I hope you enjoy, Libby!

Sunday, April 21, 2013 – 11:46am

Troy woke up to harsh midday light pouring through the windows. His head ached, pounding as he sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes. The person beside him rolled over and pulled the covers closer. Troy looked down, eyes on the line of his back and the sunlit blond hair. His stomach rolled and he got out of bed hastily, uncaring of waking his bed partner. He didn’t remember where his clothes went – the night before was a bit of a blur, and the apartment bedroom was littered with clothing. 

He found his jeans and shoes, but the shirt seemed like a lost cause so he stole a dark green shirt from one of the piles and went out to the hallway – he remembered stumbling in the door, drunk and stealing kisses. He hesitated, his hand on the doorknob, when he also remembered that they left his car at the bar. Leaning his head against the door, he swore quietly. There was no escape.

Straightening, he looked around for the kitchen. He found it; dishes were heaped in the sink, papers, brushes, sketches and drug paraphernalia were scattered across the kitchen counter and the round wooden table. He picked through the mess on the table and found a half empty pack of cigarettes and a lighter. Lighting himself a cigarette, he found some leftover coffee in the carafe and washed himself a mug. A quick turn in the microwave yielded him the burning hot, bitter caffeine needed to make his headache quiet. 

Pulling one of the chairs out from the table, he sat and smoked steadily, using an abandoned plate as an ashtray. He thought about going into the bedroom and raising hell, but he needed the time to pull himself together. It had been a long time, and he still wasn’t entirely sure how this had happened.

~*~*~*~

Saturday, April 20, 2013 – 2:11pm

“Are you sure about this?” Troy glanced at Mary, who was walking next to him on the sidewalk. “They hurt like hell to remove.” 

“I’ve thought about it for months, don’t make me second guess now.” She brushed hair out of her face, tucking it behind one ear. “You promised you’d be my support here.” 

“Double checking and making sure you’re not drunk counts as support – nothing leads to regret quicker than alcohol and a tattoo gun.” 

“Yes, Mr. Voice of Personal Experience.” Mary touched his shoulder to make him stop. “One day you’re going to have to tell me that story. But here we are.”

Troy stopped and turned to look. The tattoo shop wasn’t much to look at, but it was on a busy street and there were plenty of cars parked in the parking lot around the back and on the street. “I suppose there’s a requirement for it to look like a dive.”

Mary shrugged. “It’s supposed to be a great place. I was reading on one of the online boards about it. Don’t judge a book by its cover.”

Troy raised his eyebrow. “Hope so – it’s your skin.” A bell rang when he pushed the door open. As Mary stepped up to the counter, Troy looked around. The space wasn’t that big but it looked clean. The front counter took up space, along with two waiting chairs, one with a stack of magazines and tattoo design books on the seat. Behind the counter were two stations, one occupied with a customer and working tattoo artist. Artwork was everywhere, painted on the walls in murals, mixed with dark and light, stylized to fit the vibe of the shop.

One mural in particular caught his eye on the far wall, something about it… he asked the girl at the counter who was going over the details with Mary, if he could take a look and she waved him back with a ‘just don’t get in the way.’ 

He noted the place seemed bigger once past the counter, and there was an extra room at the back, the door shut. The artwork in question was a bold piece, one that stood out among the rest, wide in scope and based in a historically-bent fantasy world. A deep valley with trees and farms, a river running through it. Troy moved closer and the rest of the piece came into view – a large structure nestled against the side of the valley, with a small town built around it. The back of his neck prickled, his mouth went dry. He knew this place, this work. 

“Excuse me, can I help you?” 

He hadn’t heard the door open. 

“No, I’m just here with a friend.” He heard his voice outside of his body as if someone else were speaking. 

“Ery?”

He shut his eyes, fighting a shiver, but he turned and faced the man three steps from him. They looked at each other in silence, taking each other in. Finally Troy cleared his throat and said, “Hi, Fin.”

~*~*~*~

Sunday, April 21, 2013 – 12:15pm

The plate was heaped with ash and cigarette butts by the time Fin came into the kitchen. It looked like he’d pulled on some sweat pants and nothing else, his hair in absolute disarray. He was visibly surprised to see Troy there, but he didn’t pause from his mission. Troy watched him check the carafe and start another pot of coffee. 

“Stole the last of the coffee, I see. Some things haven’t changed.” 

“Coffee is sacred. Don’t fuss. I don’t ask for Eggs Benedict in bed - least you can give me is coffee.” Troy exhaled, blowing smoke out. 

“You always were kind of easy that way.” Fin grinned.

Troy gave him an unamused look. “Don’t make me regret this more than I already do.”

Fin paused briefly at the kitchen sink as if to start the dishes, but he sat instead at the table with Troy, who offered him a cigarette. He shook his head and shuffled through the papers to find a tin filled with loose leaf and some cigarette papers. He rolled a joint with the quick efficient ease of long practice. 

“If you regret this so much, why are you still here?” He lit up, and the smell of marijuana reached Troy’s nose. It was a smell both familiar and revolting - made him want to go to the window and get away from it. 

“Because we left my car at the bar, idiot,” he snapped, hackles rising.

Fin didn’t rise to the bait, and gave him a cool look. “You could have walked back.”

Troy stared at him, then grudgingly said, “I didn’t remember the way.”

Fin took this in, rested his elbow on the table and leaned in. “I thought you had a good time last night. I thought…” 

“That we were back to who we were before?” Troy drank the dregs of his coffee cup. “It was never going to happen, Jon.”

The choice of name was deliberate, and he got the desired effect. Fin tensed, losing some of his easy-going air. “That’s not my name.”

“It was your name once.” Troy ground the cigarette butt into the plate instead of looking at him.

“Once. That’s not who I am.”

“Changing your name doesn’t change the past.” 

“Oh, like leaving does?” Fin countered quickly.

“I had to get away. I was drowning.”

~*~*~*~

Saturday, April 20, 2013 – 2:59pm

Troy watched Fin prepare the station for Mary, sterilizing the equipment and following the safety protocols. He could tell when her nerves kicked in, but she was determinedly brave through the stenciling process. He gave her a reassuring thumbs up, fighting his own instincts telling him to go now, before it was too late. When the tattoo gun started, she closed her eyes. The sound of it combined with the visual of Fin working on the back of her shoulder made Troy remember. He touched the inside of his forearm, feeling through his sleeve for the scar. 

Fin chatted easily with Mary, giving her questions to answer, drawing her out and distracting her from the pain, though she said it wasn’t as bad as she thought. The white noise of the crowd, the hum of the machine and the sound of Fin’s voice made his thoughts drift back through memories he had not let himself think about for a long time. 

They had met while Troy was still in high school. An overachiever, prepping hard for college, he knew a lot of people but didn’t have too many friends. But he met Jon at one of the parties his older sister threw when their parents were out of town, and Troy was drawn like a moth to a flame, despite or maybe because of their obvious differences. Jon was an artist– he’d finished up high school already and was ‘taking time off to really work on his art and sharpen his focus’. It should have been his first warning. 

They spent more and more time together as the year progressed. Friendship turned into more and Troy struggled with balancing life with his first boyfriend and his work load at school. When he finally graduated, he moved in with Jon and delayed college, maybe indefinitely. With a slight grimace, he remembered the wars he fought with his parents over it.

Then he left, surprising both his parents and Jon. Moved to another city, started over, went to college. That was the clean version. The version he told the people in his life now, the stripped down and sanitized version. He rubbed his scar, absently, a tic he’d never quite shaken despite various attempts.

He had started over. 

~*~*~*~

Sunday April 21, 2013 – 12:26pm

“Drowning? Don’t talk to me about drowning. You didn’t wake up to an empty bed and a note saying goodbye, don’t try to find me. Clearly, you didn’t want my help.” Fin got up from the table and walked around the room restlessly. 

“There was no way for you to help me. How could you help me get out of the mess we were in when you were in deeper than me?”

“Oh, is that what we are calling it now? Just – a mess?” 

Troy sighed. “Yes, a mess. Not divine, not fate, not even a freak accident. Just a fucked up mess mixed up with overactive imaginations and drugs.” 

Fin stared at him for a moment, then finally said flatly, “Really.”

“Yes.” Troy matched him, look for look. “It wasn’t real. But you wouldn’t believe me, I knew you wouldn’t believe me.”

“You saw what I saw. You know better than anyone it was real. That world, those people…us. How can you say it wasn’t real?” 

Fin stopped his pacing, coming to stand in front of him, forcing Troy to look up. 

“It took four years of therapy,” Troy said, even though it hurt him on the way out. “What we were doing – it wasn’t healthy. I gave up a year of my life for… for a fantasy world.” 

“No.” This was said quietly, with the firmness and conviction Troy remembered well. A wall of certainty, a strong thread of belief that was unshakeable. This was why he had left, this was why he had known there was no other option than to leave quietly. 

“I can’t explain it to you – neither of us could then, either. The dreams, the visions…the _knowing _in our bones.” Fin knelt in front of Troy, breaking the invisible barrier between them and touching him, a hand on his cheek. “You remember it, Ery. There’s no way you couldn’t.”__

Troy closed his eyes, pain aching in his bones. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. “Yes, Fin. I remember. How could I forget? I haven’t. I just – put them in their proper place.”

Fin was quiet, said nothing in response. Troy heard his breathing, the sound of the cuckoo clock – why did he have a cuckoo clock? – and then Fin let go of his cheek.

“That’s something I can’t do.”

~*~*~*~

Saturday, April 20, 2013 – 4:30pm

Troy pulled himself out of his thoughts with a start. Time had moved quickly, and Mary’s design, one of her favorite quotes with beautiful calligraphy, was not complicated. Fin carefully cleaned her new tattoo off before applying a sterile bandage. He walked her through the aftercare and then smiled. “Not so bad, was it?” 

“Well – it wasn’t fun, but I was expecting worse. It got me in a weird place there for a bit.”

“Careful now, once you start, it’s hard to stop.” Fin lifted up his sleeve and showed her his arm. A quote wrapped around his wrist, and he had an elaborate compass pointing north stretched across his upper arm.

“Two’s not bad,” she said.

“Oh, there’s more, but I don’t usually show those to people unless they buy me dinner first.”

Troy’s mouth tensed unwillingly and he noticed Fin caught it. He schooled his face to neutrality. 

“Well I wouldn’t mind buying you dinner.” Mary grinned.

“You have to be at Michael’s at five,” Troy reminded her. She shot him a look, then sighed regretfully. 

Fin laughed. “Sorry, not in the cards, seems like. Go up to the counter, Rachel will help you finish up.”

Mary headed for the counter and Troy moved to go with her, but Fin grasped his arm. “Wait – you aren’t just going to leave...?”

Troy looked at him and then looked down at the hand on his arm. The expression on his face made Fin let go of him. “What more were you expecting?” 

“Dinner, drinks – something, whatever. Can’t we at least catch up before you disappear again?” 

He shook his head. “I don’t think it’s a good idea. I didn’t even know you were here or I…” He didn’t finish the sentence, he didn’t need to. Fin looked as though Troy’d slipped a knife in his gut. He was struck with guilt and the pang of missing him. Though his brain screamed no, he said, “Fine. Drinks tonight.”

Fin smiled, small and brief. “Good. You have somewhere in mind?”

Troy hesitated, and Fin filled in the gap. “There’s a bar around here I visit a lot. Known for their cocktails, but you can get a good beer too. We can meet up here if it’s not too far for you?”

It was a good forty minutes, getting here, but Troy didn’t want to meet closer to his place. No, rather just a one off on the other side of town. “That works fine. I’ll be here at eight,” he said. Mary called him from the counter and they left the tattoo shop, but not without Mary teasing him about the hot tattoo artist. 

~*~*~*~

Troy parked his car by the tattoo shop. He was a few minutes early, but he planned for that. It was a busy Saturday night with the strip full and bustling with people out. The weather was perfect for it, spring warm, cooling in the evening. He lowered the windows half way to let in a breeze and sat quietly. The radio was a welcome distraction and he listened to the music, eyes drifting shut.

His therapist would tell him it was a bad idea. From what he could tell, it didn’t seem like Fin had changed. And how did he end up in Chicago? He wasn’t stalking him, was he? Various scenarios filled his mind, and he caught himself breathing faster. _Calm down - think._ He forced himself to go through it logically. No, it wasn’t likely. It had been years and his parents would not have told Fin that he was here now. His dream had been to go to MIT back then. But everything had crumbled to pieces at that point, and he had moved to Chicago instead. Eight months later, with rehab behind him and ongoing therapy, he made it into University of Chicago. 

If Fin had been chasing after him, he would have gone to Boston, Troy reasoned. And it would have been a lot sooner than this. It was chance, unless Fin proved otherwise. He just needed to be careful. Pulling his left sleeve up, he looked at the underside of his forearm. Little remained of his tattoo, black ink gone, just a small patch of scar tissue they said had been unavoidable. 

He remembered the night they’d snuck into the tattoo shop where Fin worked. It was so late that it was almost morning and they were high – as they so often were then. Fin had gotten everything ready, swearing he’d pay the guy back for the supplies, while he had sat in that chair and trusted Fin so much…

Troy’s breath caught in his throat. It had hurt, the needles in soft, thin skin. He remembered being fascinated at the lines and curves forming, the script he had only seen in his head and drawn on Fin’s sketchpad. Some deep part of him knew it was his name. Not Troy, but Erestor. 

People had advised him to keep it, a reminder of what he had gone through, what was behind him, but he couldn’t. Every time he looked at the name, he hurt and remembered everything he was meant to leave behind him. After the ink was gone and the skin had healed, it had helped. But it was still there, written in invisible ink, burned into his mind’s eye. 

He never got another tattoo after that. 

Suddenly the breeze wasn’t pleasant anymore, bringing a chill weighed down with ghosts. Checking the shop door, he saw Fin walk out, slipping on a jacket and looking around. He lowered the window and called out to him. Fin jogged towards the car and the driver’s side.

Troy watched him come closer and took the chance to really look at him. He was much as Troy remembered him, but the eight years apart had left some changes. Still a bit too lean for his height - because of the continued drug use, if Troy had to guess. His blond hair was shorter, cut to shoulder length, and his face had matured, the difference between 20 and 28. Troy felt the familiar stirrings – pain, anger, desire, old love - and knew he wasn’t ready for this, but it was already done. 

“We can walk from here or you can drive?” Fin leaned in the window slightly and looked over the car with interest. “You’ve done all right for yourself, haven’t you?” 

“Not too badly,” Troy said. “Get in and tell me where to go.”

As it turned out Fin was right, the bar was not far from the shop. It was one of those hipster bars, with house-made ingredients and a theme. Troy didn’t mind the crowd and they found their way to a back booth. Waiting for the server, he caught Fin looking at him. He wished for a cigarette, but the list of public places you could smoke were dwindling. 

“What?” He raised his eyebrow, fingers rubbing against the roughened edge of the table. 

Fin shrugged. “I’m allowed to look, aren’t I? It’s been a long time, and you’ve changed.”

“You haven’t. Not really. Still working in tattoo shops, going by Fin. Still nursing that trust fund and getting high all the time?” He was surprised how bitter he sounded. 

“Fin’s my legal name now. It was always better than Jon, anyway.” Fin leaned forward and Troy felt uncomfortable with the intensity of his gaze. “And yes, I still get high. You mean you haven’t?”

“No. Not since that last time.”

“Just – left it all behind, didn’t you? Without a second glance back.” 

Troy lifted his chin and met his glance. “Yes. I moved on. Now buy me that drink.”

~*~*~*~

2004-2005

It had started all fairly innocently with smoking joints in Jon’s basement. His roommates were around, along with friends and it was just something to do on a Saturday afternoon. Troy remembered when it changed though – when Chris handed him a water pipe filled with a different kind of drug – salvia. It took the usual time to sink in, but the effects were different than he was used to: he started seeing things. Jon did too. That wasn’t weird in and of itself, but the weirdness came from them seeing things that matched up in the details.

They started taking salvia more often and a world slowly began to unfold. They stopped doing it socially, started doing it more and more by themselves. They learned how to guide each other to explore and remember details, new aspects. They called each other new names, from these memories/visions. Erestor and Glorfindel. In that world, they were lovers – Ery and Fin - and they lived in Imladris, that place Fin had painted on the tattoo shop wall. One of their favorite things to do was to get high and then Jon would paint or sketch some of the things they had seen. Troy would write some of his memories, he used to have books of his writing.

The salvia wasn’t enough after a while, and Jon – Fin – found a source of mushrooms that they were promised would be better, produce more stable visions, and for longer. They no longer kept it to weekends, they did it every chance they could. That was after Troy had moved in with Fin and given up on college. It just seemed so unimportant in the light of what they were doing. They tried to talk through what was happening to them – Fin had decided it was reincarnation, Troy wasn’t sure what it was, but he was in love with Fin and with the world they were discovering. 

His parents fought with him, said he’d lost his mind and cursed the day he met that boy. Troy cut off his ties with them, in the way only an eighteen year old in love could. He took a part time job at a grocery store, and Fin continued his work at the tattoo shop, which usually paid for the drugs, while the trust fund money covered Fin’s apartment, food and gas.

It worked until it didn’t. 

Troy still remembered the night that everything had changed. They must have gotten a bad batch of mushrooms, and in the middle of one of their dreaming visions, he became very, very ill. He suffered through that experience, while Fin was still deep within his own trance, distant and at a place Troy couldn’t reach. He spent that night in the bathroom, and the full weight of what he’d done with his life had become clear.

None of it was real, who were they kidding? Everyone sees weird stuff when they’re messing with drugs like that. He saw the reality of their messy apartment, their chaotic life and knew this wasn’t the life he had planned, not the one he had dreamed of. It was a cold, hard wake-up call. After Fin came down from the high, he remained oblivious, still stuck in his dream world, and Troy quietly withdrew – declining future chances to get high, because of getting sick. He knew what he had to do. 

Three days later, he left their apartment, left Fin passed out on the bed with a letter Ery wrote on a page of his sketchpad on Troy’s side of the bed. After an emotional phone call with his parents, they arranged for his flight to Chicago and his admission into rehab. 

~*~*~*~

Saturday, April 20th, 2013 – 10:22pm

“You were right – the drinks are good here,” Troy admitted after finishing his third glass of black rum and ginger beer. The alcohol relaxed him, the music lifted his mood and Fin, well…he’d forgotten what good company he could be. 

“Of course I’m right. Come here often – my apartment building’s not far so it’s damn convenient. And yes, Chicago’s nice. The winters suck, but the tattoo scene here is awesome.” 

“I don’t mind them. Got to dress for it, though.” Troy caught the eye of a server – he needed another glass of that stuff. “You really didn’t know I was in Chicago?” 

Fin put his hand on Troy’s arm, waited until he looked back at him. “I had no idea. None of our friends knew where you went. I reached out to your parents, but they basically told me to fuck off. I thought you were in Boston, though. It’s what you used to talk about.” 

Troy closed his eyes briefly, shook his head. “No, there wasn’t a spot for me in the program I wanted by the time I…” he swallowed the words ‘got out of rehab’, “…was ready. So I went to the university here. It worked out well. First couple of years were really hard though.” 

“Yeah.” Fin drained the last of his whiskey. “Nearly went mad after you left.” He said it quietly, but it cut through Troy more than he wanted to admit.

“Did you get my letter?”

“I did, yes. Kept it with the rest of your journals. And I got on with life in the end, because there was nothing left to do. Hoped I might see you again.”

“You kept my journals?” Troy thought of those pages, filled with notes, stories, and memories. 

Fin nodded. He played with his whiskey glass for a moment, and Troy could tell he had something to say. He raised his eyebrow as a question.

“Who was she? Your girlfriend?” Fin finally asked. 

“Mary?” Troy leaned back. “We met in college. We figured out after a while that we were much better as friends.”

“Good friends are important.” Fin looked pensive, and Troy wondered what he was thinking. Before he could ask, Fin got up. Troy was startled. Was he going to leave already? He surprised himself by being unhappy at the thought. Fin noticed, and a little smile appeared on his lips. “You want to dance?”

“Dance?” Troy echoed.

“Yes. Dance with me.”

He hesitated merely a moment before he took Fin’s hand and stood with him. They went to the back of the bar, where there was the world’s smallest dance floor and a few couples on it. Troy laughed, he didn’t know the song and was sometimes horrible about paying attention to these things, but Fin drew him close and they danced together. It was hard to explain what dancing with Fin was like, he didn’t understand it himself. But they fitted together and try as he might, he couldn’t shake the feeling they had danced together many, many times before. 

He relaxed and let Fin lead them, following the music. His favorite songs were the slow ones, low and wistful. It was easy to forget the crowded surroundings and just focus on this tiny world. 

He heard Fin then, mouth close to his ear, voice under the music and the chatter. “I missed you.” 

Closing his eyes, he leaned against Fin. He didn’t say anything, he didn’t know what to say. The truth didn’t help. “I need another drink.”

~*~*~*~

They had that drink and more. Troy lost track of the drinks, smoke breaks, and the dances they had. All he knew was that he was happier than he had been in a good while, and Fin was like whiskey, burning on the way down and then making him hot and flushed. His hands were sure and confident, his laugh shiver-inducing, his breath warm on Troy’s cheek. 

They stayed almost until last call, the last couple on the dance floor, not even really dancing, just swaying and holding onto each other. His head rested on Fin’s shoulder, one arm around Fin and a hand clasped tight in his. Fin’s free hand had slowly, but surely, slipped down from the small of his back to the curve of his bum.

“Ery?”

“Mmm?”

“Are you going to come home with me?” Fin’s voice was quiet, and Troy felt his question, the vibrations from his chest, as much as he heard it. He closed his eyes, rubbing his cheek against Fin’s soft cotton shirt. 

“Are you asking me to?”

For a moment, Fin stopped dancing, and Troy looked up. “Yes. Don’t have a written, formal invitation, but – yes. Come home with me.”

Later, Troy might blame the alcohol, the loosening of inhibitions, or himself for his poor decision making. But looking into Fin’s blue eyes, he knew there was only one inevitable answer all along. 

They left the bar not long after, Fin telling him not to worry about the bill, it was on his tab. Troy remembered the tabs Fin used to run and wondered why they were allowed out the door, but wisely said nothing. They were both too drunk to drive and Troy had no plans to let Fin behind the wheel of his car anyway. Fin swore that his apartment wasn’t far, so they walked instead, close by each other, the night chilly and the city streets slow at that hour. 

Fin’s apartment building turned out to be decent – more so than Troy expected. It even had a working elevator, which was good because Fin was on the seventh floor and Troy didn’t know how he’d have managed all those steps. They got in, Fin hit the button and they waited for the doors to close. Troy felt awkward, all of a sudden, and weirdly shy, wanting to rub against his scar but fighting the urge. 

Finally the elevator started to move and Troy let out a sigh of relief at the motion. Fin looked over at him as Troy looked up and it broke the ice. Fin moved closer, crowding him against the elevator wall, which felt comfortingly solid against his back and very much needed as his legs wanted to give out when Fin finally kissed him. He slid his arms around Fin’s neck and kissed him back fiercely. He tasted of whiskey, smoke and the slight tang of blood from the edge of a sharp tooth on soft flesh. 

Fin’s hands on his body made him moan and push against them, but the elevator ride was too short and the ‘ding’ broke them apart as they reached their floor and the doors slid open. Troy let out a shaky laugh, and let Fin get out first, holding his hand and following him to his apartment door. 

Fin fumbled with his keys one handed, and the whole process would have gone much faster if he hadn’t been kissing the side of Troy’s neck while he was unlocking the door, but the door did open finally, and they spilled into the apartment. Fin’s hand was already finding his way down the waistband of Troy’s jeans when he had the presence of mind to put his hand on Fin’s wrist and ask, “Roommates?” 

“Don’t have any,” Fin said, in between kisses along the length of his clavicle. On some level, this bothered Troy, the logical part of him said this couldn’t be possible. “Oh god, you aren’t dealing drugs on the side or something, are you?” 

Fin reached for him, over jean and cotton, grasping and rubbing. “Hush.” 

Troy shuddered, pushing his hips into the touch, swearing. All he got was a breathless laugh from Fin. “No, actually, I think I’ll be doing that to you.”

“Then take me to bed, unless you’re going to have me here.” 

Fin kissed his mouth, hard, then took him by the hand and led him to the bedroom.

~*~*~*~

They rediscovered each other that night, with mouth and hands, pausing briefly at Troy’s scar. He could tell the absence of the tattoo hurt Fin, but he didn’t ask, didn’t talk about it, only pressed deeper into Troy and made him cry out from the sharp-edged pleasure. Fin had more tattoos since they had been together, but there wasn’t time and space to really look. Their joining was not slow and sweet, but with a hunger that was born of complications, heart pain and absence.

There was a little time, before slumber, where they lay sated and tucked together, Troy running fingers over inked skin. Fin still had the matching tattoo on his left arm, Glorfindel, in that script from their dreams. 

“Turn over, I want to see.” He pushed at Fin’s shoulder and received grumbling softened by sleepiness in reply, but he got what he wanted. He swept away blond hair, tucking it over Fin’s shoulder to get the full picture and his hands faltered as that picture came into view. A phoenix with wings that spanned his shoulders blades and down to mid-back, rising from fire and ash, and a long, black cord, and… Troy followed the length of the cord, neatly woven into the design, to the monster that held the end of the whip, a horned beast, something straight out of the pit of Hell.

“No, Fin. Not that. Why did you get that?” He was caught off guard at the depth of emotion in him, beyond him, to the part of him he used to call another person. 

Fin was quiet for a few minutes, and Troy would have thought he was asleep, but Ery knew he wasn’t. “Was a while after you left. I kept seeing him, even when I wasn’t high, followed me into my dreams. Thought maybe it would help to put him behind me.”

Troy remembered the times they had come out of their high and Fin was curled up on the bed, talking about fire, burning and no air and darkness. He remembered the sketches, hastily done, but vivid in their starkness. He was struck then as now by the sense of déjà vu, the sense that in another time, another place they’d been there before, Ery comforting Fin. 

He couldn’t breathe suddenly, the air was just out of reach. He hadn’t had anything remotely like a panic attack for a while, but he felt the beginnings of one. Fin rolled over, and the image was gone, and in its place was Fin reaching for him, pressing kisses against his forehead, cheeks and mouth. “It’s okay, Ery. It’s all right. I’m here, and you are too. Everything is fine.”

It took time and Fin’s touch to calm him down, to feel safe, to breathe again. Curled up against the warmth and solidness of him, Troy fell into a deep and exhausted sleep.

~*~*~*~

Sunday, April 21, 2013 – 12:32pm

“Then what are we meant to do, Fin? If you won’t let go and I can’t come back to this.” Troy’s chest hurt. The hangover was bad, but this felt like ripping out stitches left in far too long. “Where does that leave us?” 

“Oh for…” Fin swore. “You tell me, Troy, you’re the one running this show. I woke up this morning and looked for a note.”

The use of his birth name felt like a blow to the chest – Fin hadn’t called him that in a very long time. But that was what he wanted, wasn’t it? “I didn’t want to do that to you again,” he said quietly. His head was pounding, and there was a tight knot of fear in his gut. “It wasn’t easy for me, it took everything I had to go.”

“You snuck out and told me not to follow you. You moved to another city. If you’d have known that I was working in that tattoo shop, you’d never have come.” Fin recounted the facts, as much to himself as Troy. “But then you came back home with me. I thought it could be different… How can you leave this? How do you forget the memories, how do you forget knowing that we are so much more beyond this life?” 

“Because it isn’t healthy for us.” Troy got up from the chair, pulling strength from all the reserves he had. “Because we became so isolated, Fin. Because the drug trips were everything….we were counting the minutes to when we could do it again. Life around us disappeared. I let go of all my other dreams, and all I wanted was to be with you in the world we dreamed.” 

Fin looked at him warily as he drew closer, and flinched minutely when he touched his shoulder, like the touch hurt. But his voice was steady. “That world, those dreams – they aren’t like anything here. I can’t leave that behind me like you did. I haven’t, even if it’s not the same with you gone.”

“What if I was here? What if you got help? I would be there for you. We could have a future. Not the same as before, but – something new?” Troy tried to will it so; let that be the answer. 

“I can’t love only half of you, the part you want to accept. And I can’t erase part of my head like you erased your tattoo.” 

Troy froze, his hand dropping from Fin’s shoulder. “That’s not fair, Fin.”

“None of this is fair,” Fin replied, voice low and laced with pain. “The past eight years – were they better without me?” 

“The first two years were hell, I couldn’t breathe without it hurting.” He tried to answer honestly, fairly. “And I never would have made it without help. But – I got through the worst of it. It’s never been easy, it’s – better, some days. Different. And good in its own ways.” 

Fin watched him. “But do you remember? When the night is still, and there’s no one around, no need to pretend…do you remember?”

Troy closed his eyes, nodded. There was silence, and he was startled to hear the sound of Fin leaving. He opened his eyes and saw Fin’s phoenix inked on his back, before Fin disappeared into the bedroom. He didn’t know what to do. Was he supposed to leave? He knew he couldn’t go back into that bedroom and keep his resolve.

While he still hesitated, Fin came back, a stack of journals in his hands. Troy was confused for a moment and then realization dawned. He took them from Fin, setting them on the messy table and opening the one on top. “…you kept them.” 

“Yes, I did. I couldn’t get rid of them. If you’re going to take them and burn them, I’ll regret giving them to you. But they are yours, so you should have them.” Fin sat down and started to roll himself another joint. 

Troy didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing, running his fingers over the page. His handwriting covered the paper, in blue and black ink. There was a picture in the margin, drawn by Fin. Memories, a diary of sorts, he remembered filling the pages.

“I love you.” Fin said, finally. He looked up from what he was doing, and Troy was caught by the intensity emanating from him.

“But not just as myself, as Troy. I’m not enough for you.” 

“You are more than just Troy. You are Erestor of Imladris.” Fin’s eyes were ageless, deeply blue and more certain than Troy ever was.

Troy’s throat caught, something stirring in his chest. But he pushed it down. “I love you too, Fin. But I can’t go back to the way it was. I can’t.”

Fin sat still for a moment, and then it was as if he had reached a decision. He squared his shoulders and got up. “You know where I am if you change your mind then.”

“You’re staying in Chicago?” Troy asked. He knew it was a stupid question, but it was all he had.

“For now. If it’s better for you if I go, I will.”

Troy protested automatically. “No, of course not. It’s fine, it’s a big city.”

“I can’t pretend I’m something I’m not. If this is what you need to do, Ery, it’s what you need to do. I’ll respect your choice.”

Troy hurt. He hurt like he did eight years ago, bone deep, but he was on this road and he’d gone too far to turn back now. He flipped to the back of one of his journals, finding a half written page, and tore out the bottom half. He found a pen on the table and scribbled his number on it, handing it to Fin. “If you ever get clean, let me know.”

Fin looked at the paper, then rolled it up and stuck it in his jeans pocket. “Thank you.”

They stood in that messy kitchen, quiet, out of words. Troy knew he needed to go, leave it all behind, but his feet were frozen to the floor. He told himself to go, but at the same time Fin moved closer. Troy looked up at him, didn’t resist as he was pulled close one more time and felt Fin’s fingers under his chin. He closed his eyes when Fin kissed him, kissed him like he was precious, like he didn’t know if he ever would again. 

Tears welled up, but he didn’t let them fall. He broke the kiss, hand on Fin’s shoulder, and forced himself to step away. “I love you. I love you, Fin. But I can’t.”

“I know.” Fin shoved his hands in his pockets, clearly needing something to do with them, instead of reaching out to make him stay. “Take a left when you get to the building entrance. It’s three blocks, then take a right and cross the street. Your car shouldn’t be far.” 

“Thank you.”

“Just – go. I have your number.” 

Troy nodded – he didn’t know what else to do – and went to the hallway. He looked back, once, briefly. Fin stood in the kitchen, joint in his mouth, barefoot, bare chested, and hair wild, watching him leave. Troy took a breath, remembering this moment, then left, shutting the door behind him.

He only cried once he was away from the apartment building. He rode down to the lobby and stepped out into a bright afternoon, the sounds of city life bustling around him, and left one reality for another.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, Keiliss, for the thorough beta.


End file.
